Ukrainian servicemanDONETSK, Mar 16Ukrainian troops shelled the village of Yelenovka in the DPR, firing 12 shells with a caliber of 122 mm, reports the DPR representative office in the Joint Center for Control and Coordination of the Ceasefire (JCCC). Novomikhailovka — Yelenovka: 12 122-mm shells were fired,» the DPR representative office stated in the Telegram channel.Zelensky admitted that Ukraine will not join NATORussia launched a military operation in Ukraine on February 24. President Vladimir Putin called its goal «the protection of people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years.» To this end, according to him, it is planned to carry out «demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine» bloody crimes against civilians» of Donbass. According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, the Armed Forces strike only at military infrastructure and Ukrainian troops. With the support of the Russian Armed Forces, the DPR and LPR groups are developing an offensive, but there is no talk of the occupation of Ukraine, the President of Russia emphasized. As of March 16, more than 4 thousand military infrastructure facilities were destroyed, as well as more than 111 aircraft, 68 thousands of tanks and other armored fighting vehicles, 129 multiple launch rocket systems and 160 drones, including the Turkish Bayraktar TB2. The territory around the Chernobyl (mothballed) and Zaporozhye (operating) nuclear power plants was taken under control. Eight years later, the North Crimean Canal was unblocked, and work is underway to restore water supply to the Crimea. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, as of March 2, 498 Russian soldiers were killed and 1,597 wounded during the operation. Among the Ukrainian side, according to the Russian military department, the losses are many times higher: more than 2,870 killed and about 3,700 wounded. Foreign mercenaries fighting for Ukraine are also liquidated: according to the Russian Ministry of Defense, up to 180 foreign «Soldier of Fortune» As noted in the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, «there will be no mercy for mercenaries, wherever they may be.» These statistics take into account, among other things, losses in the territories of the DPR and LPR, which, according to UNHCHR estimates, account for 26 dead and 130 injured. The Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine called for a new «defense union» However, based on the published figures, more than 20 dead during the Tochka-U attack on Donetsk on March 14 were not included in these statistics. In this context, Russian Permanent Representative to the UN Vasyl Nebenzya noted that US Deputy Secretary General Rosemary DiCarlo, losing sight of this information, “obviously took a side in this conflict.” Against the backdrop of hostilities in a large number of cities and villages of Ukraine, a humanitarian catastrophe is emerging. The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation lays responsibility for this on the Kiev authorities, who refuse to coordinate the work of humanitarian corridors, as well as local nationalists, in some cases, according to the military department, holding civilians as human shields.
